Purpose

As a research collective, our purpose is to:

  • Examine systematically educational realities that impact SC and influence how literacy is embedded and supported in secondary content courses
  • Address educational stakeholders’ competencies and confidence in interpreting and implementing mandates from state and federal legislation
  • Create a cadre of educational stakeholders driven to improve literacy education and increase teacher agency
  • Serve as a reciprocal conduit between instructional practice and literacy research
  • Create a network of educational stakeholders to leverage information, expertise, and resources in practitioner spaces
  • Lead and engage in research-based initiatives to improve education in SC

As a research collaborative, our goals are to:

  • Determine existing and perceived content area and disciplinary literacy needs within practitioner spaces
  • Provide resources (i.e. access to technology, time, personnel) for teachers and administrators regarding content area literacy, disciplinary literacy, trauma-sensitive literacy, culturally sustaining literacy, critical literacy, and other aspects connected to reading, and writing requested by schools or districts
  • Provide professional growth opportunities for educators as participants as well as provide spaces for educators to lead professional growth opportunities
  • Create a reciprocal research-practice bridge
  • Create and enhance existing action research networks
  • Develop connections with other state/regional organizations
  • Propose and provide pre-conference and during-conference presentations connected to literacy as mentioned above
  • Engage in research for schools and districts based on their literacy-related needs upon their request
  • Write grants and seek additional funding sources to raise money to enable community participation in conferences and professional growth opportunities

The initial outcome of our research was a validated needs-assessment survey to identify teachers’ competencies and confidence in embedding content-area literacy practices. For more information on our completed survey, email us at hello@literacy6-12.org.